Communicating with Pics and Tech

The Interactive Commons (IC) endeavors to tackle some of society's greatest challenges by combining
expertise. In other words, the things that you know in your unique discipline may
provide some missing insight into the unique thing someone is doing in a
seemingly unrelated area. And, to bridge different perspectives and
sides of academia, we need some tools to help us communicate with each other. Enter
visualization.

When we can’t explain something easily, it is common to grab
a cocktail napkin and a pen and draw a picture. But, today we have tools that let us take this even further. We can put on
Microsoft HoloLenses to look at a picture together in three-dimensional
mixed-reality--completely wirelessly! Or, we can plug in a data set to a 24-foot-long by 8-foot-wide
visualization screen. Say you have neighborhood lead abatement data for the entire
county? We can look at this information as a group. Or, we can convene multiple community partners around this data in its broader
context and explore it together. In a world of endless data, we have remarkable tools that allow us to harness this information, contextualize it, and view it together.

In addition to hardware, the IC also is making available
humans to help run this technology--dedicated computer programmers, 3D modelers
and artists who serve as our technology translators and remove common
barriers to entry.

You’ll hear from those folks on this blog, too. From Mark
Griswold, who serves as director of the Interactive Commons in addition to his
full time gig as director of MRI research, to Jeff Mlakar and Henry Eastman,
the first computer programmers hired to work on Microsoft HoloLens at Case Western
Reserve University. And, I’ll be chiming in as well. I’m Erin Henninger, executive
director for the IC—I’ll be sharing the articles that inspire us, info that
wows us, and periodic commentary on how things are panning out. So far so good,
thanks to some incredible support from Case Western Reserve and amazing partners (ahem, thank you
Microsoft). Working together, we can embrace new technology and inspire each
other to think, and to see, beyond the possible.

Erin Henninger

Erin Henninger is executive director of IC. With a background in Communications and an MBA in progress, Erin attends to the overall IC operations and vision.